Chavez ‘legacy’ lives on

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There is precious little left of press freedom in that alleged worker’s paradise of Venezuela. But even the death of international thug Hugo Chavez can’t halt its further erosion.

This week the owner of the last remaining television network to criticize the Chavez regime announced he was selling — not because he wanted to but because the continuing process of government harassment made it impossible to carry on.

The station, Globovision, which was already 20 percent government owned, will be sold to Juan Domingo Cordero, who is an insurance broker with no known expertise in journalism or broadcasting.

The current owner, Guillermo Zuloaga, told the Wall Street Journal his station is “on the wrong side of an all-powerful government which wants to see us fail.” He had already been warned its license was unlikely to be renewed when it expires in two years.

Zuloaga himself has been arrested at least briefly for saying during a TV interview that Venezuela lacked freedom of expression. The station had also been fined $2.1 million for its coverage of a prison riot — no doubt because it helped show what a fraud the Chavista regime was.

Yes Chavez may already be occupying whatever hell is reserved for those who cavort with terrorists and erode a nation’s economy along with its soul, but his evil work goes on.

This is the way freedom dies — one step, one independent news outlet, at a time.